Modern aircraft are commonly designed to utilize composite structures and to incorporate a variety of high tech electronics. Although these improvements to traditional aircraft design have resulted in a wide variety of benefits to the aircraft industry, these same benefits can leave modern aircraft vulnerable to traditional concerns such as lightning strikes. Modern aircraft electronics can be damaged and malfunction if improperly exposed to the high power electricity of continual lightning strikes. Similarly, composite control surfaces, without proper grounding technology, can experience structural damage in the event of lightning strike. Therefore, the ability of an aircraft designed to withstand and tolerate lightning strikes is a significant advantage to the airline industry.
One approach to lightning strike prevention has been the use of an expanded aluminum mesh placed on the outside of the composite lay-up on an aircraft's outer surface. Aluminum grommets are commonly utilized to provide a ground path between the expanded aluminum mesh and the underlying structure. This provides a conductive path for a lightning to travel from the outer surface of the aircraft's control surfaces to the underlying structure without damage to the composite control surfaces. Although this methodology has proven successful, it carries with it undesirable increases in manufacturing time and material cost. The use of extended aluminum mesh, therefore, leaves considerable room for improvement in the protection of composite control surfaces from lightning strikes.
It would therefore be highly desirable to have an aircraft composite surface that provided lightning strike protection similarly to known methodologies while reducing manufacturing time and material cost to produce. It would further be highly desirable to develop a method for producing such reduced cost and improved aircraft structural panels that could be utilized with an aircraft design to improve lightning strike protection.